Even If Just
by unrequitedexistence
Summary: Tumblr Prompt: Andy and Sam's wedding. Chloe, obviously, did the table settings. Gail's place card has a small vase next to it; a sprig of holly.


Prompt: For Andy and Sam's wedding, Oliver, Celery and a single Gail are seated at the same table. Oliver's seat is indicated by his name on a place card. There's no place card on the table for the seat next to him but a small bunch of celery sits prettily in a vase of water. Chloe, obviously, did the table settings. Gail's place card has a smaller similar vase next to it; a sprig of holly.

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><p><em>Fate.<em>

Chloe Price believes in fate. Coincidences? Now that's a concept she's not very fond of. She would eradicate it from the dictionary, if she could. She might have literally cut the word out of one she found back at the apartment, actually. After apologizing to its pages, of course.

"It was meant to be", she keeps saying with such conviction that you find yourself doubting your own life experiences that seem to have proven otherwise. See? _Seem to have_. I hate to admit this, but Chloe Price knows just what to say to get you thinking. That, and she will push your buttons, in a thousand different combinations, till you go with the flow. _Her_ - very well planned out - flow.

I have been through quite a few of her so called _meant to be_'s.

_Chris_.

He was everything till he became nothing… nothing more than a friend. I am over it. I am over him. I haven't forgotten, though. I haven't forgotten how he made me feel. When he came, when he left… From whole to broken and back again. _And again_. I asked him to reconsider. I, Gail Peck, asked a guy to reconsider leaving me.

_Nick._

What to say, really? It was a train I kept getting on. A familiar mistake that became as much of a routine as coffee. But even coffee isn't good at times. No matter how much you need it, there are times when it just doesn't taste right. Yet, you drink it, because that's what you do, that's what you know. I am not sure if it was ever healthy. It just _was_, I guess. And it was wonderful… till it wasn't.

Oh yes, I have been through quite a few of her so called _meant to be_'s. I have been _there_, done _that_, and look at me now… I am at McNally's wedding. _Alone._

I told Chloe I didn't believe in fate. I told Chloe that I didn't believe in _meant to be_'s. She took it personally, so personally that I am now sitting at my table, with Oliver and Celery, and there's a sprig of holly by my side. It would probably mean nothing, it being a Christmas-_ish_ wedding, but there's a jar with celery by Oliver's side.

Definitely not a coincidence.

_Holly_.

I didn't beg her to stay. I didn't even ask her to. Instead, I told her to go. I sat by her side on the bench, I laced our fingers, and I told her to leave. Opportunities like that don't _just_ come up every day. I was not about to ask her to stay _just_ for me. She _had_ to go. She had to try to make it work. For her sake. For _our_ sake. I was not going to stop her from reaching the kind of greatness I know she was born to achieve. I couldn't. Even if that meant being miserable. I can do miserable pretty well. I have been trained ever since I was a kid. But Holly? She deserves more.

I put on my I-am-so-excited-for-you mask and I took her to the airport myself. It was not that hard to keep it on for I truly felt thrilled for her. I told her everything was going to be just fine. I promised I would stay in touch. There was doubt in her eyes. I reached for her hand, yet again, and I squeezed the hesitation away, reassurance tumbling us both down as hard as a wave that hasn't met the shore in an infinity. It was not a goodbye. It was a go-rock-the-world-and-then-come-back-to-tell-me-all-about-it see you later.

And I have… stayed in touch, I mean. Being fine? Not so much. Ups and downs. The usual roller coaster. I seem to have found a pit of hopelessness under the floor I was told to be the lowest point, though. That's new. I have gotten to know it pretty well, actually. And you know what? The bitterness of pity and disappointment goes _oh so well_ with the sweetness of memories of what it was and could have been…

I want it to be true. Fate, I mean. I want Chloe to be right. And that scares the crap out of me. But I want it. _So bad_. I want her to come over with a letter signed by fate itself saying that the _rightness _I felt when with Holly was not just me. I want a signed letter written by fate itself saying that we are meant to be. Because I know we are. I feel it. I can almost touch it. I want to know that I can wait… even though I have already decided to, anyway.

I _had_ to let her go. I could have gone with her, but what about Sophie? I didn't get to keep her, that's true, but how was I supposed to know? Not that I would have left, even if knowing. I got the chance to play crazy aunt Gail, crazy _godmother_ Gail. And it has been wonderful. It has been keeping me alive and out of bed. It has given me my own stack of stories to tell after the _see you later_ finally arrives.

_Holly, though…_

"I heard you needed a last minute plus one?"

The first thing I noticed when the familiar voice reached my ear, fighting to be acknowledged over the thousand thoughts currently crumbling in my mind, was that I was playing with the sprig of holly.

_Holly._

"You are here."

I felt her hand on my shoulder, keeping me in place, as she leaned over so that her lips could find mine.

"Plus one forever, right?"

I swallowed her every word and the question point that followed the _rightness_ that she too seemed to be aware of.

"_Forever_."

Whether that meant for the night, a week, a year or a lifetime, it was _everything._

As for fate?

I guess it runs out of ink every now and then. But today? It feels as sharp and as real as ever.


End file.
